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help newb. needs info on a imperial fryer

hello, i have a mobil kitchen that is permanantly parked at a local manufacturing plant, we also have a imperial 35 lb. fryer lp gas. not sure of the model,its a 95000 or 105000 btu, it has 3 burners and the outer 2 have black soot at the tops of them, the middle looks okay, when i light it the flame seems to go back toward the door a little.its leAVINF A BLACK SOOTY MARK ON THE OUTSIDE OF THE DOOR TOO, any help wil be appreciated...buck

Sorry, just made the cardnal rule in forum land did not search properly first...just read a thread down stream thisa one has yellow flame and there is a tube thing down where the burner slides over it this appears to be able to take off can i clean this or does it require pro. maintainance.? to clean burner can i just blow it out with compressed air? or should i wash it too? thanks in advance..Buck

If you are the owner or operator of this equipment please call a professional. That is not the guy who brings your propane but a commercial equipment professional. There are many possible problems that can cause the situation you describe. To answer the can you clean it question; the answer is yes. Turn off the gas where it is connected to the appliance and remove the burners from the unit. wash them in soapy water and use a suitable sized item to clear every hole in burner. Then reassemble. that is where your part ends and the pro takes over. You will be saving yourself the labor charge for the time it would take the pro to do this. make sure all parts washed are completely dry and free of water. Do not get any water on the gas valve. They hate it and will fail forever in protest from having been wet.

I agree with crymtide. Working on gas appliances requires an experienced technician with proper test equipment. LP-fired equipment has it's own, unique hazards.

However, there is one more thing you can check on your own. Again, with the gas off and disconnected, pull the fryer from under the hood and take a look down in the fryer's flu riser. That's the exhaust for the combustion gases and must be free of ANY debri for proper airflow during burner operation. There shouldn't be anything in there. Additionally, during use, nothing should be set atop that riser since that would also prevent proper flow for the burners.

Final note: If you see any globs of grease forming on the actual fryer vat - especially near where the burner flames must "flow" through (including inside the flu riser), then you may have a cracked fryer vat. If so, stop using it immmediately. It's a serious fire hazard in that condition.

Although the latter problem can be fixed by replacing the vat, for the repair price necessary to do so, you'd be better off to get a new fryer.

You'll probably notice that, during fryer operation, your burner flames are "yellow-tipping", which is a sign of incomplete combustion of the LP gas. The byproduct of that is soot. If so, you should call for service to see if there are any adjustments that can be made to the gas or air flow to elliminate the yellow-tipping. When properly adjusted, the burner flames will be all blue. You burners will also be working far more efficiently.

I WILL add that natural gas appliances tend to burn cleaner and more thoroughly than LP. When I have encountered an occasional LP fired fryer, I've found that many of them tend to "yellow-tip" the flames even when properly adjusted to manufacturer's specifications. Subsequently, that soot builds up to eventually grow those "black cloud" looking formations up inside the fryer vat's heat transfer tubes.